


Relationship in C Minior

by Etheostoma



Category: A Series of Unfortunate Events (TV), A Series of Unfortunate Events - Lemony Snicket
Genre: Angst, Childbirth, Established Relationship, F/M, Relationship Study, slight AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-19
Updated: 2019-01-19
Packaged: 2019-10-12 23:52:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,148
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17477336
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Etheostoma/pseuds/Etheostoma
Summary: The key of c minor--a declaration of love and at the same time the lament of unhappy love.Seven steps throughout the course of Kit Snicket and Count Olaf's tumultuous relationship.





	Relationship in C Minior

**Author's Note:**

> I've loved this ship for YEARS, ever since it was implied in the books, and then Netflix comes along and gives us this beautiful, well-done series and the inspiration for this not-so-little story. Inspired by the books, show, and the excellent Kitlaf works on this site. 
> 
> Hopefully I did them justice--kudos and comments are love!

**any reference to Count Olaf's surname as Crivelli and to Kit having the nickname "little fox" goes to the wonderful [Ravenhoot](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ravenhoot), whose marvelous Kitlaf works have supplied a lot of my personal head canon for their relationship.**

* * *

 

_C Natural_

They met in school, as many do—he a gangly, awkward, antisocial teenager and she Jacques and Lemony’s unconventional sister. He was the aspiring actor with a troupe of equally-dramatic tagalongs who couldn’t truly be called “friends”, she the well-liked loner dancing along to the beat of her own drum.

Naturally, their relationship began with them completely and utterly despising one another.

Since the last two generations of Snickets had gone to Prufrock Preparatory, it would follow that the new cohort would also take its turn in those gloomy halls. Kit and Jacques--and Lemony, a few years later--had been attending the school since they were old enough for their entrance exams scores to be taken as reality by the rather disbelieving staff. (In truth, they had all passed with flying colors by the time they were six, but as the minimum standard age of acceptance was ten years old, they were denied enrollment for a few years). They excelled in their classes but lurked on the fringes of the students’ social circles, choosing to observe rather than become involved.

Somewhere in the course of Kit’s fourth year at that dismal academy, something happened to upset the status quo that had, until that point, been quite carefully maintained—the arrival of a new student.

Now, this was not just any student, but rather the son of the prominent Crivelli family. Their wealth spoke to the majority of the students and faculty, and their standing among VFD caused the Snickets to, if not indicate direct interest, at least pay some attention to the newcomer.

Olaf, to his credit, did not go quietly into that good world of mandatory primary education. He appeared not on a standard day at the school itself, but rather swaggered into their midst during a rare trip to the shore, a cocky smirk on his face.

“Hello, hello,” he said, stepping over to the little cluster of the older class students. “I am Count Olaf—or, I will be, somewhere down the line.” He gave an absurd little bow, keen eyes scanning the group.

Jaques met his stare with one of his own, face stony. Lemony ducked his head, never keen on making eye contact. Most of the girls giggled and tittered into their hands, for though this newcomer was stork like and pompous he had a certain air and appeal that indicated the man he would eventually become. Kit simply rolled her eyes, fidgeted with the pencil shoved into the top of her braid, and turned back to the shell collection she had been compiling.

As Olaf was not one to be ignored, Kit Snicket instantly became the bane of his adolescent existence.

They danced around each other for months, poking and prodding and exchanging insults and sharing slander across every medium available. His attempts to incite _any_ sort of response from the odd Snicket girl grew wilder and more creative, but Kit simply waved them off and continued on with her day, refusing to give him the satisfaction of a reaction—until, one dismal, rainy day, it all came to a head in the library at Prufrock Preparatory.

“Snicket,” Olaf growled, flinging open the door and stomping past her little self-created nook in the corner. She had sequestered herself in the most comfortable armchair she could find, curled up in a small ball, legs tucked beneath her feet with a book spread open across her lap. Ignoring her after his initial brusque greeting, the teen crossed the room to peer through the window at the barren grounds below.A muscle in his mouth twitched as he watched Kit’s twin lead a group of older boys around in a game, Lemony trailing behind like a lost little puppy.

Nose buried in her book, Kit calmly ignored him, turning the page with a spare finger while her other hand drummed the armrest in agitation. So utterly engrossed in her reading was she that she failed to notice when her unwanted company grew bored with his aimless observations, instead turning his attention to her—a much more accessible adversary than the group of boys cavorting about in the courtyard.

“What are you even reading?” he demanded, ripping the book from her hands and peering quizzically at the pages, his brow drawn in consternation. “This is all gibberish.”

She snorted. “To you, perhaps,” she scoffed, retrieving her novel and slipping a mark between the pages. “It’s _Anna Karenina,_ in the original Russian.” She paused to sweep a scathing glance up and down his lanky frame. “Not that you would know, Olaf, I don’t think you can even read English.”

“ _I don’t think you can even read English,”_ he mimicked back to her, pitching his voice higher in a mockery of her own and scrunching his face up in an inane expression. “Don’t be absurd, Snicket, of course I can read.”

She knew he could, of course, for Kit Snicket was a very observant young lady. She had seen him studying in the moments when he thought no one was watching, stuffing his books into his bag whenever anyone walked by and pretending to simply be loitering. She had seen him watching the older boys and their “secret” meetings, envy green in his eyes. She had seen him up after hours, rehearsing lines in the light of the moon with only the nighttime shadows for his audience.

That didn’t stop her from pushing his buttons. With brothers like Jaques and Lemony, she had grown up in the practice of striking first before one’s opponent sought the opportunity themselves. “You don’t act it, most of the time,” she challenged. “Here.”

Blinking, Olaf barely managed to catch the book that she flicked at his head. “What?”

“Read to me,” she said imperiously, leaning back in her chair, hands crossed behind her head so that she could peer at him upside-down, blinking those big brown eyes and giving him a shit-eating grin.

He held the book out in front of him between two fingers, nose wrinkled in disgust. “What is _this?”_ he asked.

Rather than answer with the obvious, Kit just stared at him.

“Ugh, _fine,”_ he consented. “Just, stop staring at me. Stare at…the wall, or something.” He flipped the book open, letting the spine fall open at random, settling on a page about halfway through.

“The night has a thousand eyes,

and the day but one;

Yet the light of the bright world dies

With the dying sun.”

 

He groaned loudly and slammed the book shut. “What a sappy, sickening poem.” He tossed it back on the table and gave Kit an imperious stare. “Didn’t think you were so _girly,_ Snicket.”

“ _I_ didn’t choose the poem,” she retorted, rolling her eyes. “And don’t think you’re off the hook, you didn’t even finish.” She delighted in his discomfort, biting back a grin as he visibly stiffened.

“There was only one more stupid stanza left,” he muttered, shrugging.

And there it was, the evidence that he did know what he was doing, that everything he showed the world each and every day was an act, greater and more believable than any of the overdone roles he undertook in his pursuit of theatrical renown. Her gaze softened, and she gave him an apologetic frown. “Hey, you didn’t have to do it at all,” she acknowledged. She grinned suddenly, her whole face brightening and threatening to overwhelm him with its intensity. “But, I knew you _could.”_

Something shifted during that encounter, some imperceptible adjustment in how each viewed the other. Their behavior changed, slightly, new patterns working their ways into the everyday routines of the two volunteers-in-training.

If sitting across from each other (silently, of course) in the library during study periods or surreptitiously stealing food off of one another’s trays at lunch—or leading a series of surreptitious subterfuge against fellow students—didn’t necessarily mean that Kit Snicket and Olaf were _friends,_ well, it didn’t exactly do a good job at outlining their enmity either.

Unfortunately, all good things come to an end, and so it followed that Olaf was soon after expelled from Prufrock for failing his gym examination (only because, Kit knew well, he had stayed up far too late running laps to “study”).

“It’s not fair!” she exclaimed furiously, punching a hole in the flimsy drywall of his dormitory. She had snuck away from breakfast to help him pack, refusing to let her best friend leave without a word of comfort or support. “What kind of asinine, moronic, _archaic_ rule gives gym class the dominant position in ones grading rubric?” Her eyes flashed. “I’d like to see _them_ run twenty laps in thirty minutes. Bunch of overweight, ignorant, inane…”

The words flowed over Olaf, crashing over him like the waves on the beach where they had met so many months ago. He barely heard her, so stunned was he by his failure. “I don’t fail,” he muttered, shoving his hands deep in his pockets and staring down at the floor. “I screw up, I goof off, but I never actually _fail.”_ He sounded so shattered that Kit could hardly stand it.

“It’s not a failure,” she counseled, “if the ones failing you are themselves failures, and wrong to boot.” She punched him lightly on the shoulder. “You can outrun just about anyone in this place, O,” she said. “They just didn’t want you to succeed.”

Blue eyes blinked down at her, gleaming with unshed tears. “But why?”

Kit had no answer. Instead, she stepped forward and hugged him, wrapping her arms around his waist and resting her chin on his shoulder. “You’re worth more than the whole lot of them put together, Olaf,” she told him quietly. “Don’t ever let them make you believe otherwise.” Blushing, she tilted her head up and pressed her lips awkwardly against his. “I’ll do that again, someday,” she promised, giving him an impish grin as she drew away, leaving him standing dumbly in the center of the room.

Soon enough, his parents’ car arrived in the dismal courtyard to bear him away, the sleek vehicle taking him beyond the judgement and criticism of their flawed educational system.

He faded quickly into memory in the eyes of the school, but to one dark haired, dark eyed young woman his presence remained heavy in her mind. Try though she might, she could never quite get rid of the image of the brooding young man who had been her first true comrade and friend.

==

_D Natural_

They kept in touch, Kit sending missives by crow to Olaf at his new school. His replies were often brief, abrupt, and often rude, but they made her smile nonetheless. They passed a few years in this manner, time gliding seamlessly from one stage of life to the next.

Finally, the day came when they were both freed from the bonds of higher education, young and liberated and simultaneously in love and at odds with the world at large.

This, of course, was when they would meet again.

It was an unanticipated encounter, at a party hosted by the Snicket siblings’ parents just a few short months prior to their mysterious disappearance, and just after Kit and Jaques’ (rather early) graduation from university.

It was an elaborate ball, more suited to Elizabethan times than the modern era, lavish, extravagant, and overdone to the point of extreme opulence. Kit hated every moment of it. Her parents were well-known throughout the upper circles of the VFD, lauded for their multitude of successful missions—and their frequent financial donations to the cause.

Kit tried everything to avoid the affair, volunteering for every mission that she could in a desperate attempt to be out of the country when the ball was actually held.

Instead, she found herself walking down the grand staircase in a sleek navy dress and inhumanly high heels, one of the Snicket jewels glistening at her throat and irritation raging in her eyes.

“Sister!” Jacques booming voice echoed across the entry hall, and her twin slid suavely into place beside her, his hair combed back and his frame tucked neatly into an elegant tuxedo. “You look simply smashing this evening.”

Kit rolled her eyes skyward. “Too much of this and I might very well end _up_ smashing something,” she muttered, nevertheless tucking her hand into the crook of his offered arm and giving the guests at the foot of the stairs a pleasant smile.

“And then wouldn’t Mother and Father be happy?” Jacques returned. He gave her a crooked smile, which Kit could not help but return. Pretentious their parents might be, but they loved their three children dearly and often turned a blind eye to their misadventures over the years. The thought of what they might do should Kit tire of civil pleasantries and begin applying herself to the destruction of their decor was amusing, but not enough to cause her to carry through with her whimsical musings.

Her mind wandered, and she allowed Jaques to guide her across the hall into the ballroom. The elder Snickets had spared no expense, hiring additional servants to attend their guests, bringing in the finest outside catering and a full orchestra to provide the entertainment and music for dancing.

Kit, having not eaten since breakfast that morning, had eyes only for the table containing a full spread of the finest finger foods money could buy. Her stomach gave a light rumble and she frowned, mentally running through a series of simulations that might result in liberation from her brother’s company and a full plate of food in her grasp.

Ever-observant, Jacques spared her the tedium of actually having to execute any of them. “Hungry, my dear Kit?” he teased. “I believe there might be some people in Canada who didn’t hear your stomach.”

She gave a dramatic groan, clutching her stomach with her free hand. “Well, I _did_ miss lunch because _someone_ wanted a fencing partner for four hours.”

He grinned and released her hand. “Fair enough. Go forth and eat, fair lady.”

Chuckling, Kit needed no further permission, ducking under a dancing couple and sliding over to the fully-loaded table. Her eyes scanned the assembled plates and dishes, her mouth already beginning to water as she took in delicacies assembled from every major world cuisine.

Just as she was reaching for a plate, however, she felt a hand on her shoulder. The touch was light, but more than enough to incite a reaction. She jumped, spinning, one hand flying into a defensive position as the other seized the wrist of the offender, bending the hand back into a most uncomfortable position.

“Ow!” The man behind her yelped, jerking backwards. “What the hell, Snicket?”

Kit dropped his hand in shock. “You’re here,” she gasped, eyes widening slightly before her mouth spread into a delighted smile. “I hadn’t thought you would make it.”

Olaf shrugged, his perfectly-tailored tuxedo barely wrinkling with the motion, sliding back into his standard unruffled facade as his heart rate decelerated after Kit’s violent reaction. “Some missions got moved around, a few fires were never started—I wouldn’t have missed this for the world.” His lips parted as if to continue, more than likely about to launch into an impromptu soliloquy, and Kit hastily grabbed a pair of plates and threw one into his hand.

“Well, welcome back!” she exclaimed, seizing a pair of plates and beginning to absentmindedly ply them both chest-high with bite-sized food. “Have you been in town long?” She spoke quickly, uncommon nerves accelerating her mind and speech patterns as everything she had been wanting to say to him in person flew to the forefront of her mind, clamoring for attention.

Engaged in a particularly ferocious staring contest with a bowl of boiled prawns, Olaf started, jerking upright leaping wildly into the air. “What?” he asked, blinking rapidly.

Kit giggled. Some things, it seemed, never changed. “How long have you been in town?” she repeated, deftly sliding a chocolate croissant, triangle of spanakopita, and a trio of stuffed olives onto her place in a single motion. “And, for that matter, how _are_ you? It’s been quite a few years since I’ve seen you.” She allowed her eyes to sweep up and down his tall frame, now filled out in a way it had not when they were youths.

Olaf fidgeted under her scrutiny, pink spreading across his cheeks. “I’ve, uh, only been back a few days,” he stammered, “and I am well, thank you.” He caught her wrist, thumb absently running along the back of her hand as he peered down into her eyes. “How are _you,_ little fox?”

Now it was Kit’s turn to blush, a delicate flush growing on her face. “I’m also well,” she said, ducking her head. Who _was_ this timid thing? She was Kit Snicket, daring, bold, clever, bookish. She did not lose her head at a man holding her hand and sharing her gaze.

But, it seemed, she did for _this_ man.

Olaf smiled, a slow grin stealing across his face as it dawned on him that she was just as nervous as he himself was. “Why don’t we take _these_ ,” he said, jiggling the plate he still held, “and find somewhere we can eat and catch up. After all, we have quite a few years to make up for.”

And with that, the years of simple letters and telegrams and coded missives simply melted away, and it was that gloomy morning some six years before and she was a nervous girl giving her first kiss to that lanky boy about to walk right out of her life.

Kit returned his smile, teeth gleaming in the light of the chandeliers above, and laced her fingers through his. “That,” she said, giving his hand a squeeze, “sounds like an _excellent_ idea.”

==

_E Flat_

After the events at the opera, everyone assumed that it was Olaf who called off the wedding.

Olaf, with his self-righteous, vindictive fury, his willful bias and _lex talionis_ approach to justice. He wore his quest for revenge like a set of blinders, ignoring every logical argument Kit and the other traitors tried to present him. There could be no mercy for the ones who had taken everything from him, no mercy for the _volunteers_ to so “noble” a cause.

In the course of an evening, his entire world view capsized, and he abandoned a lifetime of training and morals to satisfy that primal, innate desire for revenge.

So, naturally, when the inevitable announcement came that his engagement to Kit Snicket had been terminated, everyone made their own assumptions and presumed that he had been the one to throw in the towel and turn away.

In fact, this was not the case. He fled first into his parent’s estate, then to the tunnels beneath the city, wandering aimlessly and without intent or purpose—but never once did he approach Kit, never once did he seek asylum with either side of the schism. He simply roamed, a nomad among the shadows.

Kit spent days after the funeral searching in vain, combing the countryside and sending out feelers to determine his whereabouts. She relentlessly searched the city, desperately trying to find her fiancé, to—well, there was no way to right this wrong, but she had to at least find him so that they could talk.

Finally, after a few weeks of silence, of nothing, she got word, sitting in her lonely, barren little flat three stories up in a building no one ever directly noticed. One of her little birdies came to her—there were whispers, rumors, murmurings of an unhinged nomad living beneath the city.

“Olaf,” she murmured. Rising, she flung a thick coat about her shoulders and grabbed the bag she had kept in preparedness since she had begun her search, slipping out the window to scape the fire escape and jump to the street below. One could never be too predictable in one’s habits, especially during these unpredictable times.

She wandered the tunnels for hours, burning through torch after torch as she delved deeper and deeper into the less-frequented corners of the passages. The air grew even colder, night stealing across the frigid November evening, eclipsing the afternoon and sending the subterranean world into a catatonic state.

Finally, Kit could go no farther.

Shaking, she slid down against the musty wall, the brick catching threads of her jacket as she moved. She sat on the worn floor, heedless of the grime staining her dark jeans, and bowed her head to her knees.

“Looking for someone?” The tone was too nonchalant, the voice too light and carefree for it to truly be him, but there he was, lurking in the shadows just to her right.

Kit’s head jerked up and she stared at him with wild eyes, his face just barely illuminated by the dying light of the torch she had shoved in the bracket above. “Olaf!” She stumbled to her feet, nearly tripping as she caught her foot on a loose stone.

He was there to catch her, moving into the fluttering circle of light and encircling her with his arms so that she fell into his chest, face pressed into his worn tuxedo jacket. He was warm, feverish almost, beneath her clammy skin, and she burrowed into him, exhausted tears leaking from her eyes. “I’ve been trying to find you for  _weeks_ _.”_

Lean muscle tensed beneath her arms. “While your brothers and their friends roam the city killing good men and women?” he asked bitterly. “I haven’t moved in a month,” he spat, “I’ve been right here. If you’d want to find me, you could have.”

“How could you say that?” Kit exclaimed angrily, drawing back to glare up at him. “I’ve done nothing _but_ look for you. I’ve barely slept, eating has become a chore—and you dare tell me I don’t _care?”_

A few angry tears leaked from her eyes and she blinked furiously, trying to hold them at bay.

“Kit…” Drawn by her despair, he stepped forward again, tracing the wet pat along her cheeks with his thumbs. “I’m so sorry.” He pressed his nose into her hair.

“Me too,” she mumbled into his neck.

They held their embrace for a long while, both acutely aware that they stood on a precipice, that the moments to follow would sent them spiraling down to opposite sides of the great chasm yawning before them.

“I can’t let this pass,” Olaf finally said, drawing away. “I _will_ have my revenge on your murdering fool of a brother.” His eyes were dark, his face twisted into a horrible, hateful expression.

“And you know _I_ cannot let you do that,” Kit quietly replied, stepping back so as to put yet another foot of distance between them.

He nodded his assent, teeth clenched. “I do love you, Kit,” he said, reaching out to her again, catching the ends of her hair with his long fingers. “So very much.”

A sad smile graced her lips. “I know.” Her eyes were dark, despairing, dogged by the tormented expression of one who was watching her whole world crumble at her feet. “I love you too.” With shaking hands, she drew the elegant engagement ring from her finger, catching his larger hand and pressing it into his palm. “I cannot keep this.”

Olaf shook his head, a strange expression in his eyes. “Yes you can. It was meant for you, it will always _be_ for you, no matter where the world takes us.” He slipped a thin golden chain from his pocket and looped it through the ring. “Keep it,” he instructed, pressing it back into her hands, “even if you never wear it again.”

Kit nodded mutely, fastening the chain around her neck and slipping the ring beneath the collar of her coat. “Now,” she said, suddenly businesslike, “I suppose we must go our separate ways.”

A muscle in his cheek twitched. “That would be best,” he replied, and from his tone she could easily tell that he was warring with conflicting emotions, all-too-well-aware that someone had to have first smuggled those darts _into_ the opera for Lemony and Beatrice to have had to throw.

“Right.” She stooped and picked up the bag she had brought, tossing it to him across the gap between them that had suddenly grown to span miles. “Here—some of your things.” Her brows drew together. “I thought you might be cold.”

The Count looked at the bundle in his arms for a long moment, fingers fisting in the canvas of the bag, nails digging into the thick material as he clenched his fist. Finally, he looked up, for the briefest moment the lost young man he was not allowing himself time to be. “Come here,” he commanded, and Kit, unthinkingly, obeyed, stepping into his arm’s reach once more.

Gently, he cupped her cheeks in his long hands, the bag falling to the ground with a dull thud. “Run, little fox,” he breathed, “for now it is not just me after you.” He pressed his lips to hers, fiercely, a warning as much as it was a farewell. “I’ll do that again, someday,” he promised, a slight quirk to his brow. He knelt to scoop up the bag, turning to fade into the darkest tunnel and leaving Kit alone, her heart hammering in her chest and the cold metal of her engagement ring resting against her skin.

==

_F Natural_

A sharp rap at the heavy oak door roused Kit from her exhausted stupor, and she staggered across the entry to peer blearily through the eye-shaped peephole in the door. Her eyes widened imperceptibly as she took in the disheveled man glowering at her from his spot atop the safe house’s Very Friendly Doormat. “Olaf?” Surprise rapidly gave way to wrath, and she returned his scowl with one of her own. “Why have you come? You should be anywhere but here.”

He shrugged, a half-hearted, self-deprecating little lurch of his shoulders. “I didn’t have anywhere else to go.”

  
And Kit relaxed, despite herself, her heart twisting in a sad little wrench as his mournful expression tugged at ties she had yet to wholly sever. Biting back a sigh, she unlatched the complex series of locks on the door, turning the handle and stepping back to allow him entry.

All but shaking with exhaustion, he staggered inside, leaning heavily on the oaken doorframe before propelling himself inside to rest his weight against against the adjacent wall. Grunting, he swung the door closed and latched it shut, re-sealing the excessive load of locks.

“I need to stay a few hours,” he said without prologue. “Go off-grid for a little while things simmer down.”

Kit stared at him, struck dumb by his audacity. “I cannot believe you,” she exclaimed, eyes narrowing. “You’ve just _incinerated_ my family home, destroyed an entire street of the city, and you come seeking asylum?” She shook her head. “There are fires running rampant across the city, families torn asunder. Olaf, people are _missing_ , presumed dead—by your actions.” A hoarse, choking little laugh sprang from her lips. “You used to put out fires, O, not start them.”

“And then _my_ world burned down around me,” he hissed, stepping forward, crowding her back against the wall of the narrow entry. “But you wouldn’t know anything about _that,_ would you, Snicket?”

For the briefest moment, Kit felt a flutter of fear. Thought it had only been a year, she had to hunt to find the man she had once known in his eyes. Right now, bristling with ill-repressed rage, Olaf was a stranger. She saw his eyes flash and hated herself, for she knew he had noticed her unease.

Wide hands swung up beside her head to cage her against the wall. “What now, little fox?” he breathed. He cocked his head staring down at her, taking in her fraught nerves and the agitation she so rarely displayed. His ire softened, lessening if not disappearing altogether, and he shook his head. “No matter. I just need to stay here for a day, maybe two—no one will think to find me here.”

“And for good reason,” Kit muttered, turning her head to the right within the cage of his arms so as to avoid his eyes. She took a deep breath in, coughing at the thick scent of smoke emanating from his clothes and hair. “You _reek.”_

He appeared not to hear her, staring down at the glimmer of gold peeking out from beneath the neck of her oversized sweater. “You still wear it?” he asked, eyes widening, fishing the delicate chain out with a too-long nail.

Fire blazed in her eyes. “Always,” she divulged, red creeping up her neck.

Olaf’s hands dropped to his sides, and he stood dumbly, gazing down at the remarkable woman in front of him. “And what do your _brothers_ say about that?” he sneered.

“My _brothers,”_ Kit snapped, “don’t _know.”_ She slapped him, enough to sting and send his head reeling to the right. “They’re also rather busy dealing with the after-affects of a certain _fire._ ” She slapped him again with the opposite hand, reveling in his wince.

“Ouch!” he yelped. He bared his teeth, then paused, considering his circumstances, and instead remained still, looking at her expectantly as if waiting for another blow.

Kit raised her hand, considering, then relented, instead grabbing his soot-stained hand in hers and leading him over to the couch. “My brothers do not live my life, do not _control_ my life.” She shoved him down onto one of the threadbare cushions, sinking down beside him. “So, I suppose one more thing they don’t know won’t make much of a difference.”

Olaf stared at her blankly and she sighed angrily. “Stay, I don’t care. Just—take off the jacket?”

The request was an odd one, until he realized it was coated in the ashes of what had been her childhood home. Wincing, he shrugged off the garment, leaving himself in a long-sleeve dress shirt and his frayed pants, resting his head against the back of the couch with a grimace. The rustle of pages beside him told him Kit had gone back to her book, and he continued to sit, dozing in and out of wakefulness for a long while, until he felt a slight weight against his side and shoulder, the brush of soft hair against his neck and chin.

“What have you done to yourself, O?” Kit breathed, and he realized in an abrupt moment of clarity that she believed him to be asleep. He kept his breathing deep and even, and she traced a hand along his sooty cheek. “And what have you done to _me?_ I can’t get you out of my head, even now. I let you in, so long ago, and now I just keep letting you in and letting you in, even when I shouldn’t.” She tucked her head against his neck, nestling against him and curling an arm about his waist.

Barely daring to breathe but to maintain his facade, Olaf sat stock-still as her own breathing deepened and she gradually drifted off to sleep, body going slack against him and the lines—lines that he would swear had not been present but a year before—around her eyes smoothing out. Slowly, he leaned back agains the armrest, drawing her with him so that she lay tucked against him, his arm securing her to his side.

He bent, pressing a chaste kiss to her lips, then settled back against his impromptu pillow. “I’ll do that again, someday,” he told her softly, and then allowed himself to drift off to sleep as well.

In the morning, Kit would awaken alone, the phantom press of a kiss tingling against her lips, the safe house carefully locked and sealed from the inside and the warm spot beside her on the couch grown cold, and wonder if it had all only simply been a dream.

==

_G Natural_

“Snicket.”

It was not a friendly greeting.

“O,” she replied in turn, mouth pinching to a thin line and brows drawing together. She glared at him, fierce and defiant, her head held high even as her arms remained bound behind her to the back of the chair.

“What are you doing here?” he snarled, face wrenching into a truly ferocious expression.

The force of his outburst startled her, though outwardly she barely flinched, refusing to give him the satisfaction of her discomfort.

His eyes were shadowed. “You should not be here.”

If Kit Snicket were a less observant woman, she would not have noticed the way his eyes were blown wide open, the rapid flutter of his pulse at his throat, the way his hands twisted and flexed wildly at his sides. He kept his agitation subtle, masked it behind his very real fury, but Kit _was_ observant and she _did_ notice.

Olaf was _terrified._

She knew him better than she knew her brothers, better even than she knew herself.

“You’re afraid,” the words spilled from her lips before she could catch them, and then she did flinch, well aware that such an observation was likely to only further fuel his wrath.

Olaf froze in his tracks, the dam breaking, staring at her so intently that she could feel the tangible touch of his gaze. Kit’s barely-patched heart shattered anew at the sheer anguish that swept across his face.

“Yes.”

The confession was barely audible, spoken so softly the word would have been imperceptible had she not been adept at reading lips. That, in itself, floored her. She had had only witnessed Olaf admit to a weakness twice in her life—once when he had been expelled from school when they were children and he too young to fully restrain himself, and once on the night she had accepted his proposal.

“What—“ she started to ask, but the bang of the rickety wooden door against the wall cut her off before she could give voice to question pressing at her lips.

Olaf’s head reared back and he jerked upright, back ramrod straight, every muscle in his body quivering with repressed tension.

Wide-eyed, Kit looked between her fallen lover and the intimidating pair at the door. These must be the mentors who had taken Olaf in hand following the events of the opera. She had been rather horrified at the multitude of accounts of their heinous deeds, but to now be before them, entirely at their mercy, took her to an entirely new level of apprehension.

“Well, what have we _here?”_ the man with a beard but no hair crooned, eyes alight with wicket intent as he took in their captive.“Olaf, what a wonderful little prize you have snared.”

The woman with hair but no beard stepped forward, gripping Kit’s chin tightly and wrenching her head up. “Oh yes,” she hissed, staring down into Kit’s wildly-defiant eyes. “Kit Snicket. One of VFD’s top gents.” She stepped back, leaving crescents on Kit’s skin where her nails had dug into her cheek. “We will have so much fun breaking you.” Head turning, she caught Olaf’s eyes. “ _Won’t_ we, Olaf?”

He nodded, still lacking all of the traditional bravado he so often wore like a second skin. “Of course,” he assured smoothly, cutting a glance to Kit so quickly she thought she had imagined it.

The malevolent duo changed a long glance. “Right,” the man with a beard but no hairsaid decisively, nodding once. “We will leave her in your very…capable hands, Olaf.”

His partner gave a delightfully wicked smirk. “And then we will return after the prelude for the _true_ entertainment.”

The icy cold terror that settled across Kit at her words was unlike any she had previously experienced, of such a magnitude that she felt a physical shiver scream down her spine. As one of VFD’s best agents, she had found herself in plenty of perilous situations, moments where her life hung in the balance of a few tenuous seconds—but the sheer _malice_ these people exuded was unprecedented.

Minutes passed unchecked as she met their cold stairs with a defiantly hostile glare, the tension in the room breaking only when the duo disappeared back through the threshold, slamming the door shut behind them.

Kit released a breath she hadn’t realized she had been holding. “You keep excellent company these days,” she commented, fleeing to sarcasm to mask her discomfiture. “You used to be noble, once.”

“And look where it got me,” he spat bitterly, brow wrinkling. He stared at the closed door for a long while, mouth pressed into a thing, brittle line. “Right,” he exclaimed suddenly, spinningon his heels to face her, scowling, his bright eyes narrowed as he failed to wholly disguise the distress seizing his lean frame. “Let’s get you out of here, Snicket.”

Kit, braced for a fight, nearly fell out of her chair, belatedly reaching for the ropes she had succeeded in severing only moments before. “What?” She looked from her useless bindings to Olaf, who appeared to be stuck somewhere between a smirk at her escape and a snarl of exasperation. Rolling her eyes, she stood and tossed the bindings to the ground. “You’re going to _help_ me escape?”

If her tone was slightly more condescending than was polite, well, she could be forgiven in light of current company and past history.

He stood awkwardly in the center of the room, for a moment seeming all too close to that lost little boy she had met so any years before. “You do not want to be left alone at their mercy,” he said quietly, raising his hands out to his sides in a helpless gesture, holding them there like he didn’t know quite what to do with them.

A beat of silence passed, then another, as Kit stared across the room at Olaf, silently assessing, casting her judgement as she pinned him in place with her gaze. Finally, she gave a decisive nod, just a short, sharp jerk of her head barely enough to be called a flinch. “Very well,” she assent, leaning slightly to one side to stretch a kink from her back. “Lead the way.”

Head cocked, Olaf listened for a moment as he stared intently at the door. “Let’s go,” he announced, snapping into sudden motion. Lurching forward, he crossed tot eh barren corner of the room, fingers dancing lightly over the bleached cinderblocks as he counted under his breath. “Two, seven, five… _ha,”_ he purred in satisfaction, pressing lightly against the block. It sank back, taking the rest of the way with it and revealing an opening large enough for an adult to pass through.

Reaching behind him, he grasped blindly for Kit, seizing her hand and tugging her along behind him as he barreled forward. Her fingers curled tightly around his, and she allowed him to lead her from the room into the dark passageway beyond. He struck a match against the wall with his free hand, holding the flickering flame up to an archaic torch set in a bracket to their left, the orange light casting an eerily somber glow across his face.

“Quietly, now,” he cautioned, so unlike the Olaf she knew that she could not help but obey.

They forged onward for some long minutes, silent but for their slightly labored breaths as the incline of the passageway increased.

“Where does this lead?” Kit asked, trying to memorize as much of the tunnel as she could as they moved along. There were few landmarks other than some brackets to hang a torch or lamp, and the occasional overlarge spider clinging to an upper corner of the passageway. Gravel and dirt crunched beneath their feet, tiny bright pairs of eyes gleaming up at her in eh flickering light of Olaf’s torch.

“To a crossroads,” he said, but offered no further elaboration.

Finally, after what seemed an eternity of walking, they reached the intersection Olaf had promised, and Kit suddenly knew their location, recognizing the far right tunnel as one that she had discovered many years ago, when they had first parted ways. They stood awkwardly, her hand still tucked in his grasp, stuck at an impasse that mirrored the three paths opening up before their feet. Kit was torn, every instinct screaming at her to drop his hand and take off, sprint away into the darkness and put this hellacious, draining day behind her and move on.

However, instinct and reason were overruled, sentimentality and an underlaying, innate allure that she could not hope to contest winning out instead. Drawn by a magnetism she could not have resisted had she tried, Kit stepped forward and placed a hand on the center of his chest, staring up at his too-bright eyes for an endless moment before she wrapped her arms around him and pressed her face into his dirty suit coat.

He was moving before she had stopped, his arms curling around her as he folded his tall frame around her, cradling her against him in a manner he, while out of practice, had certainly not forgotten.  “I would never allow anyone to harm you,” he promised, but the words were hollow against the all-too-raw reality of the truth. 

“I know,” she replied, her hand skimming across his back in a caress meant to both soothe and chastise, “but you already have.”

Her accusation hung between them, a somber reminder that they could never return to the past as it once had been. Finally, Kit sighed, breaking the silence, and squeezed his ribs in a tight hug. “But you can’t help it, can you?” Tilting her head up, she brushed a kiss across the curve of his jaw. “You’ve always been a wildfire.”

His breath hitched in his chest and her rich chocolate eyes narrowed in sudden comprehension. “You’re hurt.”

“Who, me?” He tried to brush away her concern, pushing her arms to her sides and retreating to the opposite wall of the passage. “I’m perfectly fine.”

Unrelenting, Kit pressed forward, unceremoniously ripping open both coat and the threadbare shirt beneath hit, ghosting soft touches across his torso. Her frown grew as she inventoried the criss-cross of welts and bruises marring his gaunt frame. “Olaf!”

Too-thin shoulders raised in a half-hearted shrug. “Pain is an excellent motivator,” he recited with unenthusiastic bravado, staring over her head at the grimy brick behind her. “I’ve never felt so alive as I do now, so _villainous, so—“_

His monologue cut off as Kit surged forward and hugged him once again, snaking her arms around his back and holding him close. “You stupid man,” she mumbled into his chest. It had been months since she had last been this close to him, nearly two years passing between their separation and this fleeting moment stolen in the tunnels beneath the city. 

Even with those long days of missions and subterfuge and solitude hanging between them, Kit had not forgotten the sensation of being cradled in his arms, of holding him and feeling his pulse race beneath his skin as she traced her hands along his sides. Even now, after all this time, his cheeks flushed a warm pink as she gazed up at him from beneath hooded eyes.

He let her cling to him for a long moment, leeching as much comfort as he could from her touch. In that moment, they were both fully aware that all his previous claims were a lie— _this_ was where he felt alive, where he felt safest, cherished, _loved._

“I’ve started down a slippery slope, little fox,” he murmured, falling back to his longtime nickname for her. “And this fall is not one you can prevent.” Ducking down, he pressed his lips to hers, a single, searing brush of skin that left her reeling.

He drew back, staring intently into her eyes. “I’ll do that again, some day,” he promised, lips twitching.

Kit’s mouth opened to offer a retort, but with a wave of his hand the torch went out and she was left in blackness.

When she had finally managed to strike a match of her own, he was gone, leaving her alone in the dank tunnel, lips barren and a few tears trickling down her cold cheeks. Takin a deep breath, she rebuilt her walls, locking herself away behind the strict facade that had become her reality.

There was no time for tears—there were fires to extinguish.

==

_A Flat_

They met again many years later, on opposite sides of a tide-pool on the shore.

“You look like shit,” she said bluntly, eyes sweeping up and down his lean torso, taking in the ratty, pieced-together suit, the wan circles under his eyes, and the silver strands lacing his hair.

“Eloquent as always,” he drawled in return, circling her warily. “You don’t look too hot yourself.”

It was a blatant lie—tired though she was, unkempt as her hair might be from sweat and saltwater, he had never seen a more glorious sight. She clutched a sheaf of papers in her hands, a pair of pencils stuck haphazardly in her hairdo, for all the world an older twin to the girl he had first seen on that same shoreline with a cohort of her peers.

The years had been hard on them both, distance and experience making strangers of them, but here on this shore she could almost pretend they both still retained some aspect of the youths they once had been.

“I heard you’re seeing Denouement now,” he commented nonchalantly, and Kit, despite her very real irritation, had to bite back a laugh at how stereotypically _male_ he was behaving in that moment.

“I am,” she informed him. “Only one, though, not all three.”

His lips twitched despite himself. “The bookish one, right? Should be a good fit, you always did have a thing for libraries. Bookish, bratty oddball little thing that you were.”

The words lacked the sting of his usual repartee, and Kit barely batted an eyelid, instead edging around toward the far end of the pool, eyeing the small shack she had been using as her headquarters and gauging the distance between her and the security of the triple-locked door. If she could only keep him talking a little longer….just enough to where he might not notice her intent. “And I hear tell that you have shacked up with Esme,” she said, turning her nose down and giving him a disapproving stare.

He snorted. “ _Was._ The woman is as transparent as a plastic bag. Plus, she ditched me for that Jerome Squalor when she saw how much money he had.”

Kit rolled her eyes. That sounded about right—the woman was ridiculous at best, stupid at worst, and an altogether atrocious combination of the two on most days of the week. Another inch, and… She took off at a dead sprint, papers clutched to her chest, racing to the little seaside shack. Her heart pounded in her ears, and she could hear sand kicking up behind her as Olaf gave chase. Breath coming in labored gasps, she increased her pace, slamming into the salt-worn wood of the door and fumbling rapidly for the key.

He caught her just as she turned the lock, wrenching the door open and muscling her inside with his body, latching the door behind them and turning to face her with crossed arms. “Give me the file, Snicket,” he commanded, a dark frown on his face. “You try my patience.”

Stubbornly, Kit shook her head, brows drawn into a ferocious scowl. “Do you know how _long_ I’ve been after these papers?” she asked, incredulous. “I’m not about to just give them away to you because you tell me to!”

The door rattled in its frame as he slammed his fist into it. “You don’t _deserve_ those,” he hissed, eyes wild, teeth bared.

Kit flinched, then squared her shoulders and leaned up so that there were scant inches between their faces. “Neither do _you_ ,” she spat, eyes flashing.

She could feel the hot air from his angry breath against her lips, felt him move even before he so much as twitched. As the last of her words left her lips, he was on her, crowding her back against the wall, lips claiming, seeking, punishing, his hands tight against her waist as he kissed her. Kit groaned, the papers fluttering to the floor behind him as she buried her fingers in his hair, twisting and pulling and indecisively flitting between pulling him closer and pushing him away.

“We should not be doing this,” she gasped against his mouth as he pulled away, taking in a deep breath, his blue eyes wild and filled with lightning.

“No,” he agreed lowly, tipping his head back down to nip lightly at her lower lip. “It is a terrible idea.”

Kit stood on her tiptoes to mouth the lobe of his ear, a gesture she knew well never failed to set his nerves aflame. “I’m _happy_ now,” she whispered, the words doing nothing to quell the electric desire lancing through her body, doing nothing to eliminate the pure, raw _need_ that lined her entire being.

Olaf gave a hoarse laugh, his hands rising to rest gently on her shoulders, his thumbs dipping down below the neck of her blouse to trace the lines of her collarbone. “I’m not.” He pressed another blistering kiss to her lips, slowly walking her back toward the twin bed nestled in the corner. “But sometimes there are moments…”

Ignoring the voice of calm and reason screaming that this was the bad idea to rule them all, Kit allowed him to guide her until the backs of her knees hit the mattress, her mouth fused to his and her hands rising to fumble with the buttons at his neck. “Moments?” she breathed, hating how needy she sounded, how, even after nearly fourteen years apart, he made her pulse race and her skin flush and her heart pound with an outpouring of love and affection that she thought had been long since buried.

“Only the moments with you,” he confessed, and Kit was lost—suddenly they were young again, in their twenties and fully in love and without the wear and cares of the world, without the agonies and injustices and long years spent toiling and tormented.

She fell back on the bed, taking him with her, and they disappeared into the past, pretending, at least for a little while, that the world was peaceful and promises had been kept and that this single, fleeting moment would last longer than just one night. 

==

_B Flat_

It seemed fitting that they would come full circle, once again reunited along the shore, the ending poetically mirroring the setting where it all began. The beach was silent but for the crash of waves on the sand, though Kit was only conscious enough to be half-aware of the sound. Her mind fluttered between an agonizing swell of pain—her injured legs throbbing and her lungs burning from the fungus and her contractions tearing her up from the inside-out—andthe bittersweet knowledge that her child was soon due to arrive in the world.

“I bring you in to this world only to leave you, little one,” she murmured, biting back a groan as a particularly strong contraction wracked her weakened frame. Such innocence was a gift in her world, a blessing and a curse amid the darkness that flooded her reality. But this child, her child—she had so hoped to be able to make more of a difference, to leave the world better than it had been so that her child might not fear to be herself, to live and love and be loved.

The Baudelaires meant well, but Kit Snicket knew she could not be saved. She persevered only for the child working its way from her womb, clung stubbornly to life just long enough to see her daughter open her eyes and face the sky for the first time. Then, Kit was well aware that she would die—she had not the health or the will to continue on.

She cried out again, losing herself in a haze of agonizing pain as her stressors combined to overwhelm her. Minutes bled together, her sense of time eclipsed by the weakening of her body and mind. The problem with a fungus that cut off one’s airways was that one required quite a lot of air during the course of childbirth. Kit floated along the rim of awareness, dipping in and out of unconsciousness as she struggled to finish this last duty she had to the world.

Distantly, she felt hands grasp her, pick her up, felt herself floating and the cool, soothing touch of the crystalline water on her feverish skin. Her head lolled, neck too weak to lift.

The water disappeared, and she became aware of the scratch of sand beneath her back, the cool breeze of the shore brushing across her face like the intimate caress of a lost lover. Then there was a hand brushing the matted hair from her forehead, its partner curling gently over the curve of her belly, and the brush of a pair of chapped lips across her mouth—the intimate caress of a tangible, very real and very present former lover.

It was enough to bring her back to the present, and her eyes fluttered open. “You,” she exclaimed, voice wavering as she took in the brilliant blue pair of eyes staring down at her.

“I told you I’d do that one last time,” he said, unapologetic as he gazed at her with a slight smirk playing about his lips.

“You are a wicked man,” she chastised, but it lacked the venom it might otherwise have held. They both knew a person was neither wicked nor good, that it was the actions that determined one’s role in this world. “Do you think one kind act will make me forgive you all of your failings?”

He scoffed. “I haven’t apologized.”

And there was the Olaf she knew, the man who had been beaten down by the world time and time again—and had done his share of beating—but always _always_ came back from it. She choked out a laugh, the air catching in her lungs as the fungus grew, and her laugh quickly turned to a hacking cough. Breathing heavily, Kit allowed her head to fall back on the sand.

She felt his hand brush her cheek, and for a moment she just floated, her mind traveling back years ago to when they were together and happy, when times were simple and organizations were whole and orphans were much less common.

“Let me see your eyes,” he told her, and his voice was so tender that she could not help but heed his words, eyelids flickering up so that she could meet his hazy gaze. Distantly, she realized he, too, was struggling, that his torso was stained with blood and his motions shaky.

It seemed she was not the only one to die today.

“The night has a thousand eyes,” he recited, “and the day but one; Yet the light of the bright world dies with the dying sun.”

“The mind has a thousand eyes, and the heart but one,” she answered, offering the answer to the stanza he had read so many years before, “yet the light of a while life dies when love is done.”

He looked at her for a long moment, his expression unreadable. “I never forgot you,” he finally said, and Kit’s tired, dying heart broke a little more in that moment. She had never forgotten him either, had never been able to cast aside that love that they had once shared. Even with Dewey, whom she loved and adored, she had never once forgotten Olaf and their connection—she had never even tried.

There was something important she needed to tell him, some final detail that needed to be shared before she could pass from this existence into whatever awaited beyond. Struggling, she raised herself up on her elbows, turning to face him. “O,” she said quietly, so that the Baudelaires could not hear, “the baby—need to tell you—“

His hand raised to card through her hair. “She’ll be an orphan,” he said, unnecessarily.

Kit choked out another sad laugh. “Yes, but she’ll have the Baudelaires. But—she’s _yours_ , Olaf,” she said, catching his hand and staring directly into his eyes.

He blinked and froze, his mind and body giving out. “But…”

Reaching over, she traced a thumb over his wrist. “Wasn’t…going to tell you, but—“

“It’s over now,” he agreed, falling back onto the sand with a hoarse cough. “What’s that thing your brother used to say? “‘Man hands misery on to man?”

“It deepens like a coastal shelf,” Kit answered, a smile in her eyes.

“Get out as early as you can,” Olaf ground out, his voice growing weaker as his body began to shut down, the red stain on his abdomen spreading.

Kit turned her head, heart jumping to her throat as she watched the last person she truly loved in this world fade. She had never thought of a reality without him, short though it would be. To see him now, waning before her eyes, was almost more than she could bear.

He turned to look at the Baudelaires, “And don’t have any kids yourself!” With a choked gasp, he fell, lifeless, back on the sand.

Kit bit back a sob, a ripple of pain reminding her that she still had one final good deed to perform in this life, one final noble reason to continue to pass breath through her body. She gave a soft wail, pushing with all her might, desperate to bring her daughter into this world before she passed. 

The Baudelaires were there, those brave, wonderful children helping as best they knew how. They did not know it, could not appreciate or understand it until much later in their lives, but the simple fact of their company and care was the greatest gift they could have offered to her during those last, endless moments. With Jacques,  Lemony, Dewey and now Olaf dead, moving on from this chaotic, tumultuous world and leaving her in their wake, she was alone. The one being left for her, the sole and only reason she had not yet followed her brothers and lovers away from this world of double lives and lies, was currently working its way out of her body, taking with it all of her remaining energy and will. 

Pain seared through her body and Kit screamed, throwing back her head and  _pushing._ She felt a great shift, a ripping and tearing and the slide of something implausibly massive. Gasping, she stared up at the impossibly blue sky without seeing, blinking back sweat and tears. She could hear the children clamoring, a moment of chaotic confusion, and then felt the press of something against her arms. Looking down, Kit stared into her daughter's pink face and the tears came in earnest, sweeping down her flushed cheeks. 

She stayed alert long enough to christen her, to pass her off to the Baudelaires--though to give her baby up broke her heart anew. Once Kit had surrendered her final tether, she laid back against the cooling sand, her heart slowing as her body registered the end of its ongoing struggle. No more. There were no more plots, no more schemes--no more fights or flights or fleeting moments of reprieve stolen in between. Jacques was dead, Lemony was gone, Dewey was dead, and Olaf laid cold and still beside her. Her baby was safe, named, and loved, and would grow up with three of the best individuals Kit had ever known. 

It was time. 

Slowly, she drew another choking breath, feeling the fungus sweep through her windpipe. The world grew dark, lack of oxygen obstructed her vision, and Kit shuddered, thinking with sadness of the daughter she would never know. "I love you," she breathed to the air, but whether she said it to her brothers, or to Dewey, or to Olaf where he lay beside her, or to Beatrice, cradled carefully in Violet's arms, she could not say. "I love you so much." Her lungs shuddered and failed, and in those last moments it was evident her words went to them all, equally, without judgement or regret or criticism.

It was simply an acceptance, a farewell, and a plea to await her own arrival as she slipped from one life to the next. 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Any recognizable quotes shamelessly borrowed from either the books or television show (which naturally I do not own).


End file.
